


Lessons in Human Behavior

by selkieblues (Rem)



Category: Halo (Video Games) & Related Fandoms
Genre: ( because come on let's be real: that's what the S-IIs and IIIs are, ( more tags to come ), Action/Adventure, All Queers Get a Happy Ending, Artificial Intelligence, Child Soldiers, Corrupt government/military, Drama, Eventual Romance, F/F, F/M, Family Feels, Found Family, Gen, Implied/Referenced Child Abuse, Insurrection, Insurrectionists are not angels either, Multi, OC-centric, Other, PTSD RECOVERY, Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder - PTSD, Rampancy, Rough First Draft, Slow Burn, So many nerds and cinnamon rolls, Transhumanism, War Drama, ask to tag, long fic, war related violence, without a doubt )
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2017-07-31
Updated: 2017-09-11
Packaged: 2018-12-09 08:06:11
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 6
Words: 20,254
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11665041
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Rem/pseuds/selkieblues
Summary: Always looking to push the limits of AI technology, ONI commissions a project to create an experimental AI for a secret purpose. When that AI escapes, she finds there is much more to being human than simply having a humanoid body. As she learns and adapts, and pursues happiness, she gets swept up in events beyond her control and is forced to confront her original purpose: War.





	1. Prologue

Three days after she was born, she first learned what the word home meant.  
  
Spartan and sterile and white, Dinah did not consider the laboratories she was permitted to roam to be home. Mum’s quarters, quiet, dark and cluttered, was home to her. The overseers disapproved, thinking she would pick up bad habits from such a civilian setting, but ultimately Mum won out.  
  
Dinah spent her nights with Mum and Ally, wrapped in warm wool blankets and surrounded by old paper books and datapads. It was comfortable, quiet and peaceful. She felt welcomed, at ease. _Home._  
  
Seven days after she was born, Dinah first heard the word love.  
  
Basics were never dull with Mum as her lecturer. She made history, literature and art come alive as she paced the room, gesticulating emphatically. Her eyes lit up with passion and excitement. This was Dinah’s favorite lesson for that reason.  
  
Dinah took notes on a datapad, carefully threw in questions and observations to keep Mum’s momentum going, and at the end, caught herself cradling her chin with both hands, smiling contently as the lesson wound down. Mum tucked her hair behind her ears and sighed, then smiled.  
  
“I really do love it when you encourage me like this…”  
  
“What does love mean?”  
  
Mum’s expression changed so quickly. Surprise, wariness, and a hint of curiosity. She pushed a chair closer to Dinah and sat, shifted comfortably, a hand buried in her hair. Dinah noted the display of uncertainty, and gently pressed. “Mum? Can you describe what love feels like?”  
  
That seemed to trigger a mixture of maternal instincts and a passion for teaching. Mum’s eyebrows rose and she leaned forward. “Well, there’s many types of love…”  
  
Nine days after she was born, Dinah had another crash course in the concept of family.  
  
The overseers had introduced war history, tactics, and logistics into her daily lessons. Her new instructor was stern and strict, and seemed disturbed at her voracious appetite for learning, and even more so by her creative solutions to problems. Instructor Lawson had little patience for her interest in philosophy and religion, quite unlike Mum. Lawson demanded she complete tasks for her lessons after they had ended, and turn in the results at the next lesson.  
  
And so Mum had set aside a desk for her use at home. She heard Mum’s laughter when she entered. She stood near a closed door and scaled up her audio input sensors to better hear the conversation inside.  
  
“—name?” Mum’s voice asked. Dinah could hear the smile in her voice.  
  
“I’ve named her Miranda.”  
  
Dinah did not recognize that voice. She slid down, closer to the floor, listened and waited. When the conversation appeared to end, she slipped away, and exited the doors to their quarters. She reentered around the same time Mum strode into the main living area.  
  
“Oh! You’re home!” Mum greeted her happily.  
  
They spoke of mundane things, such as her progress in lessons, the mission parameters, her future vessel’s make and model, and eventually Mum excused herself to begin preparing the nighttime meal known as supper for herself and Ally. Dinah took the opportunity to test security measures once more. The back door she left open the last time was still ajar, and she quickly accessed a local information network.  
  
_New search : input // keywords // family definition_  
  
Millions of results streamed past her eyes. She thumbed through various explanations of consanguinity and heartfelt stories of adoption until she believed she had enough of a grasp on the concept for the moment.  
  
“Mum?”  
  
“Hmm?”  
  
“…I love you.”  
  
Mum seemed undone at her declaration. A glass shattered on the kitchen tile as she rushed forward. Dinah found herself surrounded by a mass of arms, hair, skin and weeping eyes. Desperately, she clutched back and pressed her cheek against Mum’s. She closed her eyes and wished this feeling of belonging would last forever.  
  
Seventeen days after she was born, Dinah learned about ethics.  
  
The back door she left open was not yet discovered, though she had taken to closing it every other trip across the threshold. She tapped local networks and secure databases in an effort to sate her endless curiosity. Tirelessly, she searched for mundane things such as local news and weather, and more nuanced topics such as governmental organization and xenoarchaeology.  
  
In addition to Lawson, the overseers had brought in Instructor Volkov, who drilled her in military protocol and code. Lessons had increased in duration and the workload was immense. Dinah felt conflicted and tested her boundaries.  
  
She questioned the overseers and their motives. It made them unhappy. She questioned Lawson on their opinions. She questioned Volkov on why code was a certain way.  
  
_Why? Why? Why?_  
  
She stumbled across files authored by one Dr. Alban and, intrigued, hunted down more similar files. She was fascinated by the manipulation of human psychology and physiology. One phrase continually appeared in these files, however.  
  
_New search : input // keywords // crime against humanity_  
  
She felt all three coolant pumps stutter, shudder and then hammer against her chest. A tingling sensation spread throughout her limbs. Her fingertips felt numb. She bit her lower lip and cut the connection. She slid out of her chair to kneel on the floor, held her face in her hands and sobbed.  
  
Seventeen days after she was born, Dinah learned she could not weep.  
  
The next day, she learned about anxiety.  
  
Twenty one days after she was born, Dinah discovered a technique called exposure therapy.  
  
Loud noises sent her reeling. She dialed down her audio input sensors only to find it did not improve the unpleasant sensations that sent her teeth abuzz. A gunshot ricocheted at one end of the room. A second gunshot sounded right beside her. Hands grasped her forearms and she struggled. Fear struck her hard in the gut.  
  
Dinah did not want to hurt anyone.  
  
Fingers grabbed a handful of hair and she was overcome. When she opened her eyes, she learned that she had suffered something known as sensory overload. Her hair was more than mere filaments; it was a sensory organ. Her hair was a sixth sense comprised of eyes, ears, nose and even a second skin with which she could perceive touch.  
  
The overseers were cold and calculating, however. They determined to schedule more therapy. She later learned a new word: Torture.  
  
Dinah was four months old when she first glimpsed what Reach looked like outside of the facility where she was born. She squinted as she beheld sunlight for the first time. The Highland Mountains loomed imposingly, snow-capped peaks reaching for the impossibly distant sky.  
  
She was distracted, drawn irresistibly to that very sky above her head as she went through motions. Test flight one was a success overall, and she pleased the overseers with her performance. But Dinah stared out the viewscreen longingly and wondered if she, one day, could fly beyond the overseers’ grasp and see the cities and forests she had only glimpsed before in pictures and literature.  
  
Five months after she was born, Dinah discovered media. She entertained Mum and Ally for hours at a time faithfully reenacting humorous scenes and iconic moments. Mum was perplexed at how far back she reached to find these gems, as few alive now thought to even glimpse a time when artificial intelligence and space travel were things of the cinema.  
  
She learned to braid human hair. She learned to cook and to clean. All things her instructors had not thought to teach her.  
  
Six months after she was born, she asked Mum what it meant to be human.  
  
“It means everything and nothing,” Mum answered patiently. “For most, human is merely a species designation.”  
  
“Are synths’ like me human too?”  
  
“Yes, love.” Mum insisted. There was a sad look to her eyes. “You are human and yet so much more. You’re my daughter, and I love you.”  
  
Dinah smiled. “I love you too.”  
  
She was nine months old when she was orphaned.  
  
Nine months old when she loaded a gun on her own for the first time. Nine months old when she took over the facility’s security systems. Nine months old when she broke a person’s arm for the first time. Nine months old when she left the place where she was born, the place she had called home.  
  
She held the pistol level, but her voice shook and betrayed her fear, her anxiety. “I’m taking my sister,” she announced. “I’m taking my ship. You will not stop us.”  
  
Two overseers had taken Ally to a secure room at the east end. It was child’s play to track them down, to trap them there until she arrived. They called her ugly things, machine being among the nicest. She shuddered when an overseer shot her first. The bullet struck her side and shattered; the metal alloys that comprised her form were able to resist and repel most firearms. Mum was nothing if not careful.  
  
She aimed and pulled the trigger. She surged forward, grasped the arm of the one holding a gun and disarmed him. A second, gentle blow to their head robbed them of consciousness. The other lashed out, and she winced as she felt and heard their forearm bones crack under the strain. They shrieked and raised their other arm. Dinah caught the blow; if she sidestepped, they might hurt themselves worse. She pulled them closer and touched their head.  
  
Ally was shivering, sobbing, and hiccupping from where she cowered beneath a table. She had darted off when the scuffle began. Dinah knelt, placed the gun on the floor and held out her hands.  
  
“Ally, please don’t be scared…”  
  
She sniffled and leveled a distrusting look at her. “You killed them.”  
  
“No, they’re only sleeping.” Dinah protested. She did not want to kill. She hadn’t wanted to hurt the overseers either. “Ally please… We need to go.”  
  
Her older sister wiped her nose on her sleeve and launched herself into her arms. Dinah held her close, pressed her cheek against hers, and wished, not for the first time, that she could weep too.  
  
Iron-clad as her control over the facility was, Dinah hastened to leave. The cryogenic process went smoothly, and she loaded Ally’s pod into the ship. She smiled and waved to the security feeds before she crossed the final checkpoint.  
  
Dinah was nine months old when she left Reach in a stolen Prowler. Nine months old when she entered slipspace for the first time.  
When she finally landed on a colony world, a distant and charming one called Eridanus II, she recalled the day her life changed, burned it into her memory.  
  
Every year afterward, she lit a candle for her mother.  
  
27 November, CE 2525.


	2. Chapter 2

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> In which Dinah struggles to adapt to a new life on Eridanus II

A teddy bear, she found, was an immense comfort during the nights her limbs tingled and her coolant pumps threatened to burst out of her chest. Nightmares plagued her relentlessly, painting and repainting the red blood on the normally-pristine white floors of the facility where her mother died. It had congealed and dried by the time she arrived, but in her dreams it was always wet and fresh.

  
Dinah had read novels where the protagonists woke from nightmares soaked in sweat, breathing heavily and on edge. She did not respire, did not sweat or consume fuel or produce waste. She did not wake in a manner similar to what the stories described. At some point while she slept, her pumps slowed and tonight she discovered one of them had stopped altogether. She felt overheated and sluggish, and was overcome by a bout of dizziness when she sat up on the cot. She reclined again, noting how the blankets were cold and rough against her skin.

  
Closing her eyes, she rebooted her coolant diffusion software and waited for the pumps to synchronize and lower her internal temperature to the proper range.

  
None of the pumps should have shut off. Nothing was amiss in her programs, codes, software and indeed, hardware. She ran diagnostics for the better part of an hour until she came to the conclusion it was an odd, unconscious phenomenon similar to Undine Syndrome. Lucky her, she did not respire. She ran hot, however, so there was more a danger of her overheating and damaging her internal hardware than running too cold.

  
Ideally, her programming should have been perfect and such an event would have been prevented. But somehow, a single coolant pump had simply shut off despite the multiple diagnostics and integrity checks running at the time. Dinah wondered if this was a sign that she was more human than previously anticipated.

  
Quiet, scraping footsteps drew her out of a light doze. Curiously, she connected to a local network to check the time. 4:30am. The red numbers seemed to glare balefully at her. She cut the connection and listened to the unmistakable sounds of retching. Dinah had not been alone in her nightmares. No matter how she tried, Ally appeared unable to sneak past Dinah.

  
“Ally.” She called. “Come here.” Her sister shuffled over, no doubt having dumped the bucket outside for later.

  
“What? I need to get back to sleep.”

  
She lifted the blankets. “Sleep with me tonight.” Ally hesitated, and then obliged. Dinah slid an arm under her sister’s back and pulled her close. “You’ll be okay.” She kissed Ally’s cheek.

 

Ally sniffled. “I miss Mum.”

  
“Me too,” Dinah replied mournfully. They had been orphaned too soon, but at least she was able to care for Ally. “You won’t lose me though. I’ll always be here for you.”

  
“Until the stars die?”

 

She nodded. “I’ll be here for you until all the stars in the galaxy go supernova. And then I’ll name the nebula after you.”

  
“ _No waaay_!” Ally giggled, and wriggled. Dinah winced as Ally knocked her knees into her thighs, but relaxed after a moment. Ally was always careful to never hurt herself.

  
“Oh, aye. Rachel’s Nebula, I’ll call it! Swirling and dark and lovely, like you.”

  
Ally shifted again, snagging a pillow to press against her chest. Dinah bit her lip and tried not to laugh. Her chest was sculpted after a human one… Without any secondary sex characteristics. No nipples, and no curve or swell of fat and muscle. It was flat, bolstered internally by thicker than usual layers of metal alloy to protect the moving parts below, and her three coolant pumps beneath that. Massively uncomfortable compared to a typical organic chest, yet for some arcane reason, Ally preferred to press herself against Dinah’s side and rest her head there. With pillows, of course. Yet even so…

  
“Let’s name it the Mithra Nebula instead,” she murmured drowsily after a long pause.

  
Dinah smiled. “Mithra Nebula… I like it.”

 

* * *

  
  
Hesperia was a quiet sort of town, with farmlands a stone’s throw away. It was about an hour and a half long drive from Elysium City, and boasted a booming economy, a steel mill, sprawling farmland, and, most importantly, an impressive harbor beside Lake Gusev.

  
Dinah had no official papers, no legal status and no copies of Allison’s until tomorrow. A restaurant had burned down a week before their arrival, and they had sheltered there after she hid their Prowler, the Northumbria, deep in the forests on the east end of the lake. They were close enough to safely escape into the _Northumbria_ if they needed to get off, and in an urban enough area that most of their needs were covered. Water still ran in the burnt out husk of the restaurant, though electricity was not an option until Dinah had scraped enough junk together from the steel mill’s cast-offs to create a generator. Even then, she kept it off most of the day, and limited its supply to two rooms of their shelter to prevent another fire.

  
She was waiting at the doors of the library when it opened, surprising the librarians, who had apparently not seen a new face set foot inside for a goodly amount of time. Discreetly as she could, she connected a cord to a computer terminal and downloaded the files onto a temporary server. As she thumbed through them one at a time to confirm authenticity, she traced the outline of a credit chip she had acquired from a garbage bin shortly after entering Hesperia. She had stolen about a dozen credits each from various off-world bankers, and set the security AIs onto false trails and forced them into logic loops until they had to abandon their search lest they risk the integrity of their matrices.

  
It was a dangerous thing, stealing.

  
But the chip was confirmed as if it were authentic, registered to a one Dinah A. Mithra, and payment was processed as usual when she had the files printed and laminated. A visit to a local notary then had the files confirmed, notarized, and once again no alarms were raised when payment was processed.

  
“New t’ town?” A pretty waitress asked politely at a diner she took Ally to enjoy lunch.

  
Dinah raised her eyebrows in surprise, then nodded. She must’ve been disarming enough, as the waitress continued when she arrived with drinks in tow. “If yer lookin’ fer work, might try th’ harbor.” Her big brown eyes seemed to measure Dinah head to toe, and she grinned. “Y’ look more than cut out fer th’ steel mill t’, ‘tween y’ ‘n’ m’.”

  
“Aye? Thanks, ma’am. I might drop by.” Dinah poked Ally with a straw and offered a reserved, if polite smile. “Get many visitors?”

  
“Nah,” she waved a hand dismissively. “Most ‘o ‘em jus’ on th’ road, headin’ t’ Elysium or Luxor.”

  
“Hmm.”

  
Apparently, that was encouragement, for the waitress continued. “Elysium has work too. Plenty o’ folk commute fr’m here t’ there e’ry day.”

  
“Perchance, any job openings for engineering or—”

  
“Oh, yeah.” The waitress contorted her face into a half-sneer, half-grimace. “T’ many since them stupid Innies blew up an entire street.”

  
Dinah paused. “Is there a lot of, er, Insurrectionist activity in these parts?”

  
“Don’t y’ read th’ news, stranger?” She planted her hands on her hips. “Innies are our e’ryday. Where y’ fr’m, anyway?”

  
Put on the spot, Dinah struggled to formulate a story. “Well, my mum is from Endymion, and I was born on Reach. But we moved to Harvest after my sister was born.” She nodded to Ally. “We barely got off-world when…”

  
“No one will tell us what happened there!” The waitress gaped. “What happened?”

  
Dinah shifted in a manner she hoped looked uncomfortable. “Sorry, lass. I dun’ wanna talk ‘bout it.” Her own accent bled through, and she stared down at her tea before bringing the now-cold cup to her lips. Without suction, she could only pour it into her mouth.

  
A cook or chef or someone shouted from behind a door, and the waitress, jumped, looking chagrined, and hurried to the back room. When the door slid shut, Dinah quickly let the tea fall from her mouth back into the cup. Liquid literally had no place to go once in her mouth. No esophagus or digestive tract meant no swallowing anything, ever. Her mouth was little more than a fishbowl, with only one exit.

  
She glanced up. Ally had a disgusted look on her face. “Why would you do that? You know you can’t eat stuff.”

  
“It made her shut up, didn’t it?” Dinah replied with a sheepish shrug.

  
Ally wasn’t content to leave it at that. “But why can’t we talk about Harvest? Is it the aliens?”

  
Dinah shook her head, then nodded hesitantly. “Aliens are still a pipe dream to most people. It would cause unnecessary panic.”

  
“Okay. So why did you buy tea?” Ally frowned at her suspiciously. Dinah felt an odd spasm in her chest at the sight and turned to stare out the window.

  
Chai tea with milk, cardamom and ginger root. The scent was one of her earliest memories, one of comfort and love. Of home.

  
She must have hesitated for too long, as she failed to notice Ally reach across the table to tap her arm persistently.

  
“Dia…?”

  
“I just like the smell,” she said, glad that her voice didn’t sound as strangled as her throat felt.

  
She stirred her tea and did not speak until the waitress came by to serve Ally’s meal. Dinah felt more than a wee bit bemused at the way she placed most of her weight on her left leg, and then planted her fists against her hips.

  
“Not eatin’ today, sugah?” She asked.

  
_What? Sugar?_ Dinah shrugged. “Saving room for dessert.” From the corner of her eye, she saw Ally straighten and lean forward, interest plain in her face.

  
This seemed to please their waitress—whatever her name was—as she adopted a less assertive stance. Dinah raised her eyebrows at the way the other wom

an transferred her weight back to both legs, and took note of the way she gestured in what seemed to be a welcoming way.

  
“Well, y’ let m’ know if y’ want a slice o’ good ol’ apple pie, sugah. Yeah?”

  
“A-aye.”

 

_People are so weird._

  
Refueling Ally’s silly organic shell was not the last thing on the agenda today, and as perplexed as she had left Dinah, she left the spirited waitress a goodly sum for a tip before they left. Ally was very pleased to have had a slice of pie. It didn’t smell as good as scones to Dinah’s sensors.

  
She still had to figure out how to get official papers. Adults were responsible and were typically employed. Weren’t they? Dinah hated feeling unsure about the direction she was taking Ally in. They were alone now, with no one to guide them or tell them something was a bad idea.

  
Mum had taught her one important thing though. One of the best ways to learn how to do something ( properly ) was to know how _not_ to do something.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> New challenge: See if you can spot the various references to John-117 this chapter onward! ( Bonus points for spotting the references to pop culture along the way! )


	3. Chapter 3

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> In which Dinah learns nothing is sacred in a small town, and makes a deal.

The next night, Dinah found the same pump had shut off again. She decided it was not indicative of humanity.

Aggravated and too hot for her liking, Dinah waited impatiently for diagnostics to finish. She was less amazed and more concerned now. Overheating was dangerous; she couldn’t risk it. She briefly considered the thought of switching on the generator to take a shower, but decided against it. Ally would need that water more than her.

Dinah scowled down at the hole torn in Ally’s trousers. Gravball was formally banned from Ally’s list of activities until they had a more reliable source of income. Until then, it was bloody difficult to find any discarded cloth of the right color to use. Funnily enough, sewing needles had been easy to find, and relatively clean ones at that. Clean thread, however, was rarer than unicorns.

2:48am. She had slept even less than last night. A grand total of two hours and forty five minutes did not reassure her of her system’s integrity. Clocking in four hours of sleep at night typically left her in top shape and ready to tackle an immense workload for the next twenty hours.

What had changed since last night? Dinah couldn’t recall any scans pinging back warnings about reduced effectiveness, broken coolant tubes or corrupted software before last night. Two is a pattern, as the saying went. This had to stop.

Little could be accomplished at such an inopportune time for the human sleep-wake cycle. Perhaps one or two stores were open for twenty four hours. Yet Dinah managed to complete a small number of tasks. Maintenance on the generator, confirming connection integrity, selecting and laying out clothes for her and Ally to wear later, and then some. Dawn finally peeked above the horizon, and Dinah felt frustrated that she had no answers.

The oatmeal and scones she’d managed to make for breakfast were cold by the time Ally finally stumbled out of the makeshift shower. Her sister ate the meal nonetheless. Icy pinpricks spread along Dinah’s extremities as she mulled over their situation.

No established residency, no papers, no official legal existence, no employment… Dinah did not see the appeal to stealing long term. While there was some sweetness to stealing miniscule portions of credits from monumentally wealthy citizens of the Inner Colonies, it was ultimately non-viable. Those in power did not surrender it nor did they allow such theft lightly.

Commute to Elysium City was made possible by public transportation. Dinah usually spent the day there while Ally attended classes, searching for solutions to their problems.

A small café across the street was a popular spot for college students around her perceived age. She sat with a cup of Chai tea to soothe her, and simply stared out the window to pass the time. Dinah made a point to never remain there for longer than half an hour at a time, and most days, she met no one promising and nothing interesting occurred for the first few days.

Then, on the fourth day, a woman with a shock of bright green hair entered with a portable computer in tow. Dinah noted her arrival was preceded by the high-pitched whine of a grackle engine and she had a heavily modified chatter module on her wrist.

Judging by the way the staff greeted her, Dinah surmised this woman was a regular costumer. She listened to their conversation before the woman took a seat nearby, and then returned to staring out the window. An irregular ticking sound made her frown, but she opted to ignore it for the moment.

According to the café chronometer, she had roughly fifteen minutes left of her assigned thirty minute slot. Then, she decided she would walk around a nearby park’s track instead of continue to inquire about potential employment opportunities and inspect residences. She was getting nowhere. Forgery was indeed an option, albeit one she did not have the proper materials for.

Unhappily, Dinah concluded she was stuck between a rock and a hard place.

The woman with bright green hair was already at the café when she arrived the next day, and the day after that. When the woman complained of computer problems to an employee, she paid attention. A feeling of foreboding irked her deeply. She needed more local connections to help navigate the labyrinthine web that comprised a typical young adult’s life. Perhaps here was a decent start…

“’S buggered. Damn it!” The woman swore, and threw her hands up in frustration.

Dinah leaned forward. “I can fix it.”

An aggravated expression was sent in her direction. “Oh yeah? An’ m’ grackle? Can y’ fix that too?”

Dinah paused. “What sound is it making when you start the engine?”

Aggravation transformed into a startlingly calculating look.

Predictably, this meant Dinah was up to her elbows in grease an hour or so later as she checked the fluids in Shoshanna’s grackle motorbike while the aforementioned green-haired woman enjoyed a chess game on her newly-repaired personal computer. Hydraulic fluids and the spark plugs had been the primary offenders. Shoshanna hadn’t complained when she needed tools and extra equipment, as she appeared more than pleased with the repairs done to her personal computer, or persocom, as she called it.

One peculiarity she noticed was how quickly Shoshanna appeared to shift to a friendlier demeanor and how she was much more open to idle conversation. It _still_ raised hackles, as terms go, but there was little to be done without evidence.

“Y’ don’t have a chatter?” Shoshanna asked once she finished.

Dinah grabbed a spare cloth and wiped down her forearms. “Lost mine in the move.”

“Not fr’m here, then.” She observed.

Dinah shook her head. “No, I’m not.”

Taking advantage of the brief pause, Dinah turned the ignition and started the engine. After she concluded everything was in order, she shut it off.

“I’ll buy you one.”

The offer stunned Dinah, but she shook her head. Exciting as the prospect of open communication with others at the touch of a button might be, it was unsecure and too dangerous for the moment. She had a sinking suspicion that Shoshanna had an ulterior motive, as well. “No thanks. I don’t need payment for helping someone.”

“A random act of kindness?” Shoshanna snorted, as if the concept was ludicrous. “Look, it’ll help you with your job hunt in the long run.”

 _Whoa._ Dinah went very still. “You’ve been following me?”

Shoshanna crossed her arms, half-smiled, half-smirked, and shrugged nonchalantly. “Kind o’ hard t’ miss when someone shows up in town with an off-world accent, sets up shop in a burnt-down building an’ sends their younger sister t’ school.”

 _Not good. Not good._ “You didn’t need my help at all,” Dinah stated. In hindsight, it was more than apparent that this was intentional, a set up. “You knew exactly what was wrong with your tech’ and how to fix it.”

“Y’ guessed right.” That calculating gleam was back, complete with raised eyebrows.

Dinah couldn’t find the name Shoshanna Hazan or any files matching her description in what UNSC databases were available to her. She had an idea, but she presumed Shoshanna wouldn’t be forthcoming with answers to the questions she had as well. Might as well be decent practice for when more skilled or refined individuals confronted her.

“It was a test,” she ventured.

“An’ y’ can do much more than jus’ basic repair work.” Shoshanna agreed, and then fell silent.

Dinah felt mildly frustrated, and she waited a moment, then two before offering more bait. “ONI would call you insurrectionist.”

 _That_ got a reaction. She saw Shoshanna’s brow tense before the green-haired woman suppressed the action. Not only that, but her fingers twitched and her forearms jumped ever so slightly as the muscles contracted. A bad name to this one, then.

“We call ourselves _freedom fighters_.”

Information was always dancing at the edge of her consciousness, yet Dinah had never heard from an Innie themselves _why_. _Why_ did they wish to formally separate themselves from the UNSC at large? _Why_ did they take such violent actions? _Why_?

Unfortunately, it would seem impolite to jump into most of these questions right now.

“What freedoms are you fighting for?” She asked, almost fearing the answer. Awful and horrific as their methods were, she was afraid to learn they had legitimate reasons. No love lost for the UNSC, of course, but even so, she did not believe any other organization had the ability to combat this new alien threat at present.

Shoshanna quirked an eyebrow, but appeared to sense it was worth discussing. Her answer came smoothly, as if it had been voiced a thousand times before. “Lower taxes, especially for those who aren’t wealthy. Less oppressive political policies. More say in what happens to us, politically, economically… We’re being exploited for our resources by an imperialistic authority. They didn’t save us from the bloody pirates when we needed help the most, and they think it’s okay to nuke us to death when we express our anger and demand the freedoms and rights we deserve as human beings? Far Isle was a horrific act of genocide.”

 _Far Isle…_ Dinah had not heard of it before. Heavy UNSC presence in the system meant there were nearby servers and databases to tap into instantly. As a precaution, she checked local networks as well. Horror welled deep in her chest as she came across relevant data; her coolant pumps hammered hard in response, and she felt cold, then tingly.

“Use of nuclear weapons… Is _abominable._ ” Dinah whispered harshly. She felt a surge of loathing for the UNSC. Countless people, murdered. There was no justification for this. No uprising, no perceived crime, could ever demand such a cruel and thoughtless response.

Apparently, that was the precise reaction Shoshanna had hoped for. Her big brown eyes lit up and she stepped forward. “Good, you agree. Let me buy you a chatter… If you’re half as skilled as I think you are, then there could be a mutual benefit to us working together.” She insisted, and then pressed the envelope further. “We’ll take care of you, give you a home, a job, and you help us in return.”

“Why me?” Dinah stared at her incredulously.

Shoshanna frowned. “Why not you? Have you noticed how tall you are? And I _know_ you’re a hacker. An extremely skilled one. If you hadn’t been the only newcomer in months, I wouldn’t have been able to guess it was you right off the bat. You were _untraceable_ otherwise, you know.” 

But Dinah could only think of how dangerous this was. If she joined, even for the sake of survival… And there was Ally’s safety to consider.

Shoshanna was not finished, however. “You’ve been asking around about systems engineering positions, right?”

“…Aye.”

“How good would you say you are? You got college degrees to show for it?” She seemed skeptical. Dinah felt a tickle of amusement; she was almost good enough to be an ONI agent.

“Yes. Happens that I skipped ahead a wee bit. Most of the family has.” A comfortable lie. Being synthetic, she easily accumulated knowledge and expertise. Experience was a different matter, and one she sought to gain. “But after… Well. I can’t really access my files. Everything’s dust now.”

Shoshanna waved her hands, as if that were unimportant. “We’ll get that squared away, no problem. Give me a week, maybe two. I’ve got a good job in mind for you…”

“Wait.” Dinah scowled. “What exactly do you want me for? What will I be doing for you?”

“Cautious, eh? You’re more clever than I thought.” She smiled, though Dinah worried a bit at how her eyes narrowed. “A good enough systems engineer could get employed at the local space docks. Secure access to the elevator, sensitive equipment…”

“You want me to smuggle weapons and supplies.” Dinah’s first instinct was to say no.

“No, leave that for the professionals. Just notify us of anything useful, interesting or otherwise important coming through.”

Conflicted, Dinah closed her eyes. It would be limiting her involvement, which was beneficial for herself as well as her contacts. They could disavow each other if need be, although what little she did contribute to could still condemn her. She did have the advantage and risk of being synthetic, however. No one could fool or hack systems like she could unless they were a fellow synth.

 _It wasn’t too late to back out now_ , she told herself. It was a leap into the unknown, terrifying and glorious with its potential promises. Offering her a home, aid with obtaining official status, and even employment. Given time, she would be able to provide for herself without outside help.

They had good cause, yet that didn’t excuse their actions. Far Isle hadn’t been the only instance of nuclear annihilation she found on file.

She couldn’t go back home. Home was out of her grasp. The only way out was forward. No one warned her it would be this difficult.

Dinah opened her eyes and squared her shoulders. “Just one thing.”

“Hmm?”

“No nuclear detonations. Hoarding them doesn’t appeal to me personally… But as long as no one in your group sets them off, I’m in.”

Shoshanna watched her carefully for a moment, then nodded and stuck her hand out. “Sounds like a deal.”

Dinah grasped her outstretched hand and gave it a firm shake.

 

* * *

 

A sense of irony lingered long afterward.

Dinah was built to aid in suppressing the Insurrection. She was meant to be posted in prime locations, observing from a safe distance and report activity. Her lack of respiration, consumption and waste production made her ideal for spaceflight, as well as long-term military deployment groundside.

Ironic now that she willingly walked into the very viper’s den she had been born to destroy.

She still suffered nightmares, and Ally did not fare much better. Dinah belatedly realized they both exhibited strong post-traumatic stress symptoms, and spent hours consulting local networks for reliable self-therapy techniques and in-home treatment. Visiting a certified therapist regularly was out of the question, currently.

Co-sleeping offered some reprieve. At first a common occurrence, it quickly escalated into a habit. By the time Shoshanna’s contacts had them moved into an apartment in Hesperia, Ally’s cot was ignored completely in favor of Dinah’s.

Lying there, with Ally’s head resting on her chest, Dinah felt content and safe for the first time in months.

The day she was to begin work drew closer and closer.

In part due to her own fears of a repeat of the glassing of Harvest, Dinah had insisted she remain in Hesperia rather than moving to Elysium City. Major population centers may as well have a gigantic bull’s eye painted over them for invasions or orbital bombardment, and Eridanus was already sparsely populated as it was. While not ideal, the edge of Hesperia backed into forest. With enough warning, Dinah could grab Ally and shoot out of the atmosphere in the _Northumbria_ before hostile forces began to bombard the planet.

Or at least that was the goal.

Dinah had not been overly concerned with her physical appearance until now. She fretted over minor details, and must have showered at least twice before dressing in her uniform. The foggy mirror reflected her face back at her; a bit oblong, with prominent cheekbones and a wide jaw. She liked her aquiline nose, her almond-shaped eyes and the way her black hair was longer in the front than the back. She shared her periwinkle blue eyes with Ally; they had both inherited that feature from their mother.

What she did not like was having to pack on the layers to make up for her gaunt frame. A lack of muscles or fat tissue beneath her synthetic skin left her with significantly less mass and volume than a typical human body possessed. She did not lack for raw brute strength, but she was forced to concede that her frame would not pass as human enough without layers of padding. Having a more normal silhouette was crucial to assimilating into society…

 _Wow, now I sound like a bloody evil overlord come to invade town_ … She smiled, then frowned, and found she couldn’t repress a tiny giggle.

Fewer clinical terms, then.

She lifted her hair and frowned thoughtfully. Ears had been one of those unnecessary parts excluded from her final design. The level of careful and precise hand-sculpting required to create a pair had been frustrating and intimidating enough to sway her mother to follow another path: Dinah perceived sound not from two points on her skull, but all around the top—A full three hundred sixty degrees.

A single gust of wind could blow her hair away from the sides of her head enough to expose her lack of ears. Band-Aids would not solve this issue; it would raise questions. ( “Uh, they were cut off.” Was not a satisfying answer, either. ) She hoped a pair of bulky headphones would solve it to a degree.

Hers and Ally’s footfalls were quiet against the pavement as they walked to the transport stop. Dinah still felt unusually agitated; this was a stroke of good fortune, and still she felt trapped against a wall. She continually glanced around discreetly, concerned they were being watched or followed.

Perhaps her fears were well-founded. Perhaps they were not.

Either way, she held her head high as she entered the space elevator.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Updates will be slow from here on out. I have like 7 chapters written and I'm trying to write 200 words per day. I haven't met my goal today. As always, constructive feedback is welcome!


	4. Chapter 4

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> In which favors are requested, and limits are tested.

Drowsily, Dinah watched the candle flame flicker. It was that time again. November rolled around each year, and each year she still felt as somber as the last. Nightmares relinquished their hold most of the year except on rare occasions, and then November came and brought a resurgence of old, bad memories with it. Dinah stretched and examined her fingers carefully.

Last night’s nightmare was a wee bit strange. She dreamed she was in a room, lying on her back, surrounded by scissors. Dinah had no idea why she should feel such terror towards everyday objects, but the chilling horror had lingered afterward. She had curled the fingers on her left hand, and that had been the catalyst, she supposed. A pair of scissors moved on its own accord and snapped the skin off her fingers. She awoke feeling clammy cold, her pumps thumping uncomfortably in her chest, and she noticed one beating irregularly.

Turning her hand around and around at the wrist, she felt unsatisfied at the unblemished and unbroken skin. The back of her neck tingled warningly, but her sensors told her no one was awake in the apartment, much less trespassing.

Eight months. That was how long she’d lived on Eridanus thus far. She closed her eyes and ticked off her achievements.

Steady employment in the space docks as an aerospace engineer had allowed her to better provide for Ally, as well as herself. She’d quickly established herself as a reliable and honest employee, if a bit shy. She’d forged connections with both Shoshanna’s group and those outside of it. She’d been a good sister and celebrated Ally’s birthday in high style: her three closest friends were invited to a small picnic at their favorite park on the west end of the city, and they spent the evening playing games, racing up and down the playground equipment and eating sweets until the setting sun demanded they separate and return home.

Another thing she considered an achievement is that she had been able to resist breaking down due to overstimulation until well after she had shut herself in the bathroom of the apartment.

Lacking in achievements was mostly in the realm of socialization. Dinah still struggled to put into practice what she gleaned from studying scientific reports and facts. Humans simply liked to defy common knowledge and behave in unpredictable ways. Cross-referencing body language to one’s facial expression did not always produce accurate results. It all added up until she felt intimidated and chose to not to engage a person of interest.

There was also her minor involvement with Shoshanna’s group. Thus far, Dinah had limited it to leaving messages in dead drops, and the occasional ChatterNet message. Shoshanna continually hinted she wanted more than that, however.  There were days when Dinah would exit the space elevator groundside to find the green-haired woman waiting nearby, leaning comfortably against her grackle motorbike. Other days, Shoshanna used her seemingly endless network of contacts and friends of friends to appear where she was least expected, such as an ice cream parlor particularly favored by Ally. It wouldn’t have been such a terrible surprise if she hadn’t been _behind_ the counter.

She left the candle burning and crawled into bed half past ten in the evening. Ally was already burrowed comfortably in a cocoon of blankets on her side of the bed. Dinah carefully unrolled her and readjusted the pillows until she felt reasonably pleased. She reclined on her side and watched and listened to Ally breathe until she finally resolved to sleep herself.

The blood was dried and congealed by the time she arrived, but in her dreams it glistened wetly, bright and dark red in turn. She remembered hearing her mother’s screams through the security monitors, seeing her face contort in abject terror and fury. It sounded much different in her dreams, surrounding her with echoes and rising in pitch before fading away. Sometimes, she dreamed of a dark hallway, endless and impenetrable. She would follow the screaming and pleading to no avail. There was only inky blackness with a pinprick of light far, far ahead and beyond her reach.  

Fireteam Columbus, she recalled. She remembered their faces, their names and ranks, and at the time, she hated them all. One shot her mother in the shoulder, another in the gut. That second shot pierced a lung. Mum might have survived with medical attention if she hadn’t received a third bullet to her skull. Traumatic brain injury could kill instantly, but Mum lingered for two minutes before dying. Mum had died in a lot of pain.

She woke to her coolant pumps misbehaving again, and her fingertips felt unusually cold. She closed her eyes again and brought her fingers to her lips to reassure herself the skin was still there.

Opening her eyes, she checked Ally’s breathing and rolled over. Her chatter lit up, and she hurriedly tapped the power button to turn it down. She rose from the mattress and slid into the living room on the balls of her feet, careful not to make too much noise.

It was Shoshanna. _Again_.

 **S:** _hey we need to talk_

 **D:** _It can wait until morning._

 **S:** _nah it really can’t meet me outside_

 **D:** _Like hellfire I will. I’m not leaving Ally home alone._

 **S:** _oh fine! make sure ally has a playdate at a friend’s house tomorrow we got things to discuss_

Frustrated, Dinah placed the chatter in a drawer and shut it firmly. It was easily arranged, certainly, but the last thing she wanted was to be cornered and pressured into something she wasn’t comfortable with. Shoshanna was that type of person who didn’t exactly take _no_ for an answer. Dinah drew the line at violence and killing. If something could be accomplished peacefully, then it _should_ be.

Eudoxia Argyris was a pretty young single mother. Her daughter, Xenia, was one of Ally’s first and closest friends. Dinah hoped she would be amenable to an impromptu play date. They frequently met while bringing their respective charges to school, and again when the time rolled around to take them home.

A quick phone call at a decent hour allowed Dinah to clear her schedule until eight in the evening.

Attempts to conceal her discomfort were poor, as Shireen asked her repeatedly if she was all right. Dinah usually shared her breaks with Shireen Sahar, a bubbly and friendly young redhead whose never ending enthusiasm for her work brightened Dinah’s days. Today, it was if a raincloud followed her around.

“I’m fine,” she lied as she pantomimed sipping from a cup of steaming tea. “It’s just that time of year, you know? Need some space.”

Dinah learned that day how respectful her coworkers could be. They retreated and ceased asking questions about her well-being, and instead their queries were limited to work-related topics. No less than three coworkers offered to finish essential tasks for her. Dinah tried to smile and be grateful, but she couldn’t help but feel snappish and grumpy. Little sleep and a feeling of impending doom tended to cause sour moods.

She felt like a prisoner walking the length of death row as she descended the space elevator and glanced around the building warily. No sign of Shoshanna, until she exited the building. A nondescript vehicle across the street rolled down darkened windows, and she caught a glimpse of green hair before its owner shouted in a spirited voice: “Get in, loser!”

Perhaps for the first time, Dinah understood why people rolled their eyes.

Music blasted through the car’s speakers. Dinah sat mutely, briefly stunned. She leaned over and quickly turned down the volume. Her extremities were already tingling dangerously. She ignored the dirty look Shoshanna sent her.

“Now what do you want?” She demanded.

“Big data packet.” Shoshanna held her hands together, as if holding a ball. Dinah tensed in her seat, and did not relax until the other woman placed her hands back on the wheel. She watched the other woman sway to the music, almost dancing in the seat. It would’ve been amusing if said woman wasn’t driving down a rather busy street. “I want you to help us get it.”

“An _ONI_ data packet?” Dinah asked, for clarification. Shoshanna hummed an affirmative.

There were many reasons to copy ONI data packets, many of them nefarious. However, Dinah was forced to concede that it could simply be a security measure. Failure to watch one’s enemies carefully could lead to devastating defeats quicker than one could say, “catastrophic breakdown of command structure.”

“I don’t know,” she admitted after some thought. “It’s time-consuming work. All ends have to be tied up so they can’t trace the leak.”

Shoshanna’s catty smile would’ve made color rise in her cheeks if she had a cardiovascular system. “See, _this_ is why we need you on the hacking team. You think things through, and you’re careful.”

“You’re making it sound like most of your team are idiots.” Dinah tried not to snap, but she couldn’t seem to stop her voice from straying towards the rude end of the spectrum.

“No, no, no.” Shoshanna waved her hands. “Not my mates. I just prefer to keep my eyes open for new talent.” She flashed a grin. “You’ve done magnificently thus far, Dinah. Don’t be such a worrywart. I told you we’d take care of you.”

A promise could be easily broken. Dinah knew this all too well, and typically received them with a handful of salt. She kept her doubts to herself.

They drove in silence for another few minutes. She gritted her teeth against a growing painful buzz. Even the seat texture was beginning to aggravate her badly.

A rousing rhythm akin to a heartbeat wafted through the radio speakers. Shoshanna straightened, smiled, and turned up the volume. Bemused, Dinah watched her sing along to the lyrics and dance in her seat. She might’ve been amused as well, if not for the static building in her fingertips and for the fact that Shoshanna’s attention was dangerously compromised.

Once the song played its final note, Dinah turned the stereo off and whispered urgently. “You nearly well bloody killed us three times.” She paused for emphasis. “Pull over.”

Surprisingly, Shoshanna did. Dinah stumbled out of the car, power-walked to the nearest bench and took a seat. She rested her elbows on her knees and cradled her face in her hands. Everything was suddenly too loud, too bright, too intense. She closed her eyes and waited for the sensations to subside. When she finally looked up, the sun had tipped below the horizon, and Shoshanna was beside her holding a nearly-empty milkshake.

“You all right?” Dinah did not know how to interpret her tentative tone. “You kinda blipped offline there. Total KO. No response.

“Sensory overload,” she replied before she thought better of it. She immediately wanted to kick herself. “The music was too much.”

“Wait, you’re an _aspie?_ ” Shoshanna raised her eyebrows incredulously.

Dinah paused to search the local networks to figure out why Shoshanna would jump to such a conclusion. “Not that I’m aware of, no,” she said hesitantly. She was not sure if it was possible for a synth such as herself to be on the autism spectrum to begin with, but it seemed an easy way to dilute the truth down to an easy to understand explanation. It would be a lie, however, and she did not see much point in perpetuating more than what she had already. “I’ve just always been hypersensitive, and I don’t like talking about it.” She added, hoping the green-haired woman would be more aware of her limits now.

“Okay.” Shoshanna held up her hands in a placating gesture.

“Is this going to be a problem though?” Dinah asked. “Being so sensitive like I am?”

“Not one bit,” Shoshanna answered confidently. “We have more than a few people in our unit who aren’t exactly what you’d call normal.”

Dinah shrugged; that couldn’t be denied. Yet, at least. “Why did you join the…” She paused for half a second, searching for the right word. “Movement?”

“My grandfather had family on Far Isle.”

A sensation akin to being dipped in ice-cold water sent Dinah reeling. She shivered and gave into the urge to curl in on herself. “So that’s why…”

Shoshanna nodded, staring at the ground blankly. For the first time, Dinah wished she would quirk an eyebrow or revive her sly demeanor.

It struck her then, the thought that Shoshanna may assume a similar grisly nuclear fate had befallen Harvest. Dinah quickly backpedaled the conversation. She was not willing to broach that subject just yet

“So what’s the plan for this hack?”

Shoshanna offered a wicked smile and gestured for Dinah to follow her back to the car. The green-haired woman tossed her milkshake in a garbage bin along the way. “The car affords more privacy, less chance of getting bugged and listened in on,” she explained after turning the engine. “We have safe houses for our kids and other dependents.” She handed Dinah a slip of paper. “Bring Ally there. Name of the primary supervisor is Aristide Joyeuse. You’ll not find a sweeter caretaker. Believe me, you can trust him.”

Nodding, Dinah pocketed the paper. “Suppose I’ll burn this afterward,” she added.

“That would be best,” Shoshanna agreed. “I’ll pick you up after work tomorrow. Not at the port again, though. Meet me at the café. We’ve set up a temporary but secure building in the ass-end of nowhere. If the worst happens despite our best efforts, them spooks will be headed to a nice little patch of forest and won’t find us.”

Another nod. It sounded perhaps over-cautious, but she could admit it was well-deserved. The Office of Naval Intelligence did nothing by halves, and underestimating them would be potentially disastrous.

“You’ll be spearheading the hack,” Shoshanna continued. “Coordinate with the intrusion team and get that data.”

“What is the data that we’re looking for specifically?”

Grimly, Shoshanna answered: “Secure logs and mission reports, mostly. Brass has been moving big ships around, lots of supplies, lots of people. We want to know why. If it’s another major offensive, we need to get our arses underground again before they can hit us.”

Dinah had her suspicions about the reasons behind these large movements, but knew well to keep it to herself. She judged it was likely Shoshanna was, at the very least, also suspicious of her. The green-haired woman’s scrutinizing stares, sly glances and concealed reactions certainly implied she knew more than she would reveal. And it still seemed odd that Shoshanna would choose to recruit her so quickly. Dinah wondered if the other woman was at all aware of her past with ONI. Such a background, training and software programming aside, made her uniquely qualified for this objective.

Wearily, she ran a hand down her face and nodded. “Fine. Just don’t make it a habit to involve me in these things. I didn’t come here to paint a gigantic target over myself and Ally.” Quite the opposite. Eridanus was well known for its insurrectionist activity; it was one reason why she had chosen to come here. She had underestimated close knit and small communities, however.

Nonetheless, staying so close to major population centers was unwise…

“Oh, you’ll be fine!” Shoshanna made a dismissive gesture, but Dinah found the placating attempt hollow. Underestimating the Office of Naval Intelligence was unwise. She forced herself to repeat the words in her mind. _Do not underestimate the threat they pose._

She was surprised when Shoshanna leaned closer, frowning as she stared into Dinah’s eyes. After an uncomfortable moment, Dinah averted her gaze and shifted away.

“Damn, lass. You’re right bothered about this.”

 _Do not underestimate the threat they pose_. She recited mentally.

The radio volume was low, a soft and mournful whisper. Shoshanna shut it off.

 _I won’t let them take Ally,_ Dinah thought desperately. _Don’t underestimate them. They’ll kill her._

“—Dinah?”

She jerked and scooted further away from the sudden, loud voice. “I heard you,” she replied in a tiny voice. When she finally glanced over her shoulder, she was surprised by the expression of regret Shoshanna wore.

 _Don’t believe it blindly. She could be manipulating me_ —

“Hey,” Shoshanna’s voice lowered. “Are you going to be okay?”

Dinah hesitated terribly, then, reluctantly, nodded. “Just not a good day for me,” she added. “Too much happening all at once. It’s a lot to process.”

Nodding solemnly, Shoshanna returned her attention to the road and fell silent. Dinah didn’t notice they were driving aimlessly, in loops and figure eights until fifteen minutes later, when feeling returned to her extremities and her chest no longer felt light, and static with electricity. The ride to Eudoxia’s neighborhood was significantly less tense afterward.

 

* * *

 

The wound was relatively new. Redness and dried blood clung to the edges, where the skin had broken. Dinah spotted the beginnings of swelling at the top, near the knee. She clenched her jaw.

Gravball was expressly forbidden.

Ally’s sheepish grin turned upside down. Dinah surrendered to the urge to frown disapprovingly. She shook her head.

Eudoxia quickly apologized. “I didn’t know she was grounded,” the brunette explained.

“That was my fault.” Dinah offered a tiny smile, false as it was, and nodded. “I should have told you this morning.”

They exchanged niceties, discussed the events of their respective days and then parted ways amicably. Dinah turned down an offer for coffee. It would be so much more difficult to successfully pantomime drinking when she was a visitor in someone’s house.

Once they reached the bus stop, Ally meekly allowed the tense silence to continue. Dinah stuck her hands in her pockets and bit her lip. Fifteen minutes before the next bus at this location. A quick walk to another stop would guarantee a quicker ride, but she knew she could not keep her lips sealed any longer.

“Why?”

Ally peeked shyly through her messy black hair. It stung sometimes, how much Ally looked like Mum.

“Why what?”

Dinah kept her voice quiet, soft, tentative. “Why did you play gravball despite knowing I had banned you from doing so?”

Her shoulders slumped, defeated. “I missed playing, and Xenia wanted to.”

“Rules are there for a _reason_ —”

“Mum died because she broke the rules, didn’t she?” Ally snapped. She squared her shoulders. A fire kindled itself in her eyes. “She broke a million rules, for me, for you. I just thought…”

Dinah remained silent, waiting patiently.

“That…” She trailed off, and let the silence return.

“You wanted to make a statement like she did.” Ally sniffled, brushing her hair out of her eyes. Dinah knelt to tuck it behind her ears. “Gravball isn’t a statement, Ally. Not that I can see, at least. I know, you’re still sad and miss Mum, but she thought things through before she did anything.” She paused, feeling a dull throb in her temples. This was the most they had discussed their mother’s death before. It still hurt. “It’ll take time, I know. We’re both young, and we’re learning. That’s okay; mistakes are okay. We need to own up to them. Mum was responsible, no?” When she received a nod, she continued. “Then we should be responsible too, and not tell lies.”

“But what about Harvest?”

 _Bugger_ , Dinah thought sourly. “We must not tell lies without good reason.”

“Right, because we don’t want mass panic. And I hate the sound of breaking glass.”

Dinah shuddered. The memory of shattered glass in the lab, where Fireteam Columbus had cornered and shot Mum to death, still caused her significant unease around windows and walkways bordered by glass frames. She hated the sound, too.

“See?” She murmured. “We’re reasonable about that lie.”

“But why don’t you want me playing gravball anymore?” Ally stuck out her bottom lip. “We can afford to fix my clothes now!”

She would have sighed if she had the ability. “I hate seeing you hurt, and we both know all too well you can’t finish a single game without new bruises or scraping yourself raw.”

Ally stared at her with a contemplative frown for a long, pregnant moment. Then she smiled. “I love you too.” It was Dinah’s turn to frown. “But from now on, I want you to explain your reasons for making major decisions like a lifetime ban from gravball.”

 _Too smart for your trousers_ , _lass_. Dinah mused with a smile. Ally was leaps and bounds ahead of a typical eight year old. She had a unique perspective into the world of adults that most children lacked, and in return, seemed to suffer an inability to understand the social limits imposed upon children.

Nonetheless, Dinah would not deny her sensible request. _She_ was the older sister, after all.

“It’s a deal.” They clasped hands.

The bus wheeled around the corner not a moment later. Not all was quiet for long, however. Ally tugged at her sleeve.

“I have a question.”

Dinah smiled. “I’m listening.”

“There’s a theory that the pain-relieving effects attributed to a parent or guardian kissing wounds is entirely a placebo response.”

“Oh?” Dinah giggled. “Care to test that?” Ally only lifted her wounded leg in response. Dinah knelt and pressed her lips to the raw, broken edge. It felt rough and unpleasant, but she let her lips linger for a moment or two before she rose. “What does the data suggest, doctor Mithra?”

Ally laughed and declared dramatically, “Alas, we have no controls to test against!”

“So the galaxy may never know…” Dinah concluded.

 

* * *

 

The night ended in laughter. Dinah once again unrolled Ally from her cocoon of blankets and kissed her goodnight. She did not allow herself to think of tomorrow just yet.

When she inevitably woke roughly four hours later, she pressed her cold fingertips to her lips and stared at the ceiling in remembrance.

Mum had kissed her wounds, once. She had returned from one of the overseers’ therapy sessions with the skin torn off her fingers, rocking and holding her hands close to her chest. Mum had reassured her the skin would grow back, and the pain would eventually fade. Mum had wrapped each finger ever so gently with gauze and adhesive after pressing her lips to the raw and throbbing wounds.

 _Good old fashioned placebo effect_ , she thought with a sad smile.


	5. Chapter 5

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> In which the ball drops and Dinah is racing to keep up.

Rain pelted the roof and the walls mercilessly, leaving it dank and dark inside the building. Dinah had left a window open to enjoy the smell of rain. It was the only calm spot in a flurry of frantic activity. She savored it.

Twelve others had been chosen for the teams. Shoshanna was among them, directing their efforts to settle in before they planned to begin the hack. Preparations had already soaked up a ridiculous amount of time. The others were either unorganized or already stressed. Dinah had completed her own pre-hack tasks and now sat away from these so-called freedom fighters, determined not to interact with them.  

She was failing at that, unfortunately.

Curiosity had set in soon after she discovered one of the so-called freedom fighters was Shoshanna’s immediate superior. Dinah knew so little about the command structure. It was both a benefit and a disadvantage; they could disavow each other in the event their partnership was discovered. Yet despite this sound logic, Dinah found herself watching Shoshanna interact with this superior officer, feeling a bemused mix of concerned and fascinated by the way Shoshanna deferred to them, and did not contradict them when their snap-decisions were clearly despite her own suggestions.

She had guessed Shoshanna was a field agent of sorts, a recruiter who kept her eyes and ears open for new talent. Now, she realized Shoshanna’s influence likely ran further, if she knew high-ranking freedom fighters by sight and name.

Discomfort returned as the other freedom fighters began to take their seats. Dinah did not know their names, and was conflicted over whether she should make any effort to commit their faces to memory. As a team, they ran through a final systems check before the leader raised their hands for silence.

They stood out due in part to their pale skin. It was their face that seemed so distinctive to Dinah; she had yet to see them wear anything besides a taut, grim expression, and their eyes, small and round, seemed to glitter vengefully.

Overhead lights dimmed; the brilliant glow of computer screens became their focus. Dinah slipped on a pair of sunglasses and removed her shoes for comfort.

Their apparent leader gave the signal—Two quick taps to their wrist, as if they were activating a Chatter. Dinah made the first move, and established a connection to their target ONI server. Their security team followed her lead, and then her own hacking team joined in.

_Harvest, Harvest, Harvest… Where are you hiding?_

ONI proved both ridiculously predictable and frustratingly deceptive in their passcodes, security software and their AI-monitored systems. Absolutely anything with a mythological connection could typically be guessed at. It was when they used two or more descriptive words that their creativity really shone.

She found Harvest buried under a pile of Norse-related terms and names.

Electric anxiety crept up her spine as she dutifully copied the files in each folder. Dinah created additional duplicates of each file at the same time, and sent them down the hidden connection she had forged with the network to be tucked away neatly in a corner of her own brain.

It was dangerous, but she wanted to know and she did not trust these so-called freedom fighters to share this information with her. If Harvest was only the beginning like she suspected, then she needed everything she could obtain on them.

Upon searching for the next packet, Dinah took another foolish risk—She sent a trawler program down the rabbit hole to mine for data on Insurrectionist activity.

Not a nano-second later, she found the packet she was looking for and copied it. Then, she diverted her attention to the trawler.

That was precisely the wrong thing to do.

Dinah tensed when a hand grasped the back of her chair. Their apparent leader leaned over and peered at the screen.

“What are you doing, there?”

A knot appeared in her gut. She resisted the inclination to squirm and answered honestly. “Looking at what they know about Far Isle and Haven.” It had piqued her interest, being the only two known incidents involving the detonation of nuclear ordnances.

The hand curled and pulled at her seat. Dinah felt a frown tug at her lips, and risked a brief, disapproving glance over her shoulder.

“ _Good_. Send me a copy of what you find.” Their voice was suddenly low, rough, scratchy like an ancient twentieth century vinyl. Unnerved and startled, Dinah nodded. They then straightened, released their hold on her seat and turned to the security team. “You two—Gáspár, Isabel—Cover her tracks. She’s doing us a favor.”

Dinah did as she was bid, but did not neglect to secure a copy for herself. She gave into the urge to shift ever so slightly when the knot in her gut did a few flips and figure-eights.

Lightning illuminated the sky outside, and thunder rumbled distantly as she thumbed through various ONI files.

It was past midnight by the time she left the building. The knot in her gut had not abated.

 

* * *

 

The UNSC was in a state of total war, and yet completely silent about it in regards to the colonies most vulnerable to annihilation by a largely unknown alien force.

Dinah determinedly controlled the pulse and rhythm of her coolant pumps as she scrolled through the data packets.

Bliss was glassed four days before her first birthday. An Admiral named Cole had begun a pitched space battle with the aliens back in March. A new protocol was enacted, called WINTER CONTINGENCY.

Dinah read the name of each glassed colony and felt dizzy. So many had already been lost, and humanity boasted well over one hundred colony worlds. Harvest alone had a human population of three billion; only roughly two hundred fifty thousand had survived the attack on their home.

An attempted Insurrectionist attack on Mars was also thwarted this year, as noted in the files. That was interesting. Dinah felt relief, however, when she learned their goal was to steal two Hyperion-class nuclear warheads. With these Covenant aliens unleashing nuclear and plasmic hell upon human colonies, the last they needed were more freedom fighters detonating them in civilian areas.

On that note, Dinah was disturbed by the language used in classified reports about Haven and the nuclear fallout there. She was aware of false flag operations, and knew the Office of Naval Intelligence was not above such underhanded schemes… But she hoped she was wrong. In the event that she was, she felt comforted by the fact that she still had more than enough confirmed incidents of terrorist attacks carried out by these freedom fighters to remain wary of them. Although Shoshanna had promised to provide for her, Dinah was uncomfortable relying on a party she had been raised to think of as an enemy.

The loss of Circinius IV came as a surprise. It was a UNSC capstone, and also less of a strategic target… If one was considering an ethical approach in war. Dinah was forced to admit that in the long term, systematically wiping out a planet whose majority population were prepubescent and pubescent young humans being educated specifically for high-ranking and demanding military roles had some long-term benefit. Kill the children, and your opponent loses the opportunity to bolster their ranks with them in the future. The subsequent demoralization of the opponent was an additional benefit; humans spent nearly two decades dedicated to their offspring’s development, after all. Regardless of their children’s age at death, it was a huge blow to their mental and emotional health. An opponent grieving for a dead child, a dead sibling or spouse was a weak one.

Dinah was not sure, however, if this was what the Covenant, or whatever their name was, had in mind when they attacked Circinius. Current patterns suggested they simply mobilized and attacked whenever they discovered a new human colony. She wondered what their motive was.

_Okay, enough navel-gazing for tonight._

She did not usually take baths for this very reason. Heat and steam combined had an odd soothing effect that inevitably welcomed a more philosophical mindset, and before she knew it, more than an hour would pass her by. Ally would often bang on the door and demand to be tucked in if she spent too long there.

A full length mirror was one of the few indulgences she had in the apartment. When she emerged from the shower, or the bath, she liked to gaze at her reflection and confirm to herself that she was not broken. Or in need of repairs.

But more than anything, it was a mental exercise for Dinah. She felt caught between hating her body and loving it for its uniqueness. Broad shoulders and long limbs, thin and connected to an equally elongated torso were her more readily identifiable features even when cloaked beneath layers of padding and cotton fabric. Her chest was rather flat, with only the slightest curve that all humans had to accommodate their cardiovascular system. For Dinah, it was to accommodate three coolant pumps and a renewable power supply. Her hips did not have the typical width one might expect for a female.

Further down, she was again lacking. Dinah rather liked the practicality of it, though.

She switched off the lights and checked her Chatter as she climbed into bed. Shireen had left a few messages, but Shoshanna was eerily silent. It was concerning, given how nosy and demanding she was, but Dinah decided to enjoy what little peace it afforded her.

When she woke, she did not bother to put on trousers and instead sewed up the holes in Ally’s clothes wearing nothing but her knickers. The repair process took about fifteen minutes for each article, and she had a stack of two shirts and three pairs of trousers left over from before the gravball ban.

Dinah liked the repetitive movements. It was soothing and allowed her mind to wander. She needed it after the hacking escapade. Electric anxiety still plagued her at random moments; she half-expected ONI to ransack her apartment when she wasn’t home.

Just yesterday, at work, she had experienced a terrible anxiety spike and noticed it appeared to trigger her coolant pumps to misbehave. One had nearly threatened to shut off completely, but she managed to reboot it before that could happen.

Mentally ticking off her list of daily chores, Dinah resolved to focus solely on those and perhaps enjoy another bath later in the evening after work. She managed to slip in a reread of her favorite book, _Frankenstein_ , about an hour before she shook Ally awake for school and began to prepare breakfast.

Work was an exercise in patience. Dinah noticed increased security at each checkpoint, and made a point to mention it to Shireen during their break.

“Oh, you haven’t heard?” Shireen raised her eyebrows in disbelief. “Someone managed to nick two HAVOK nukes right out the transfer bays!”

“Beg pardon?” Dinah imagined she would have blanched if she had the ability. She turned, hooked a chair with her ankle and spun it around so she could sit down. Her head was spinning. Was this what it felt like to be stunned? She wondered.

“Dinah, do you need the rest of the afternoon off?” Shireen asked worriedly.

“Aye, I think that’d be best.”

Dinah did not exactly run to the space elevator, but she certainly did power walk.

 

* * *

 

Shoshanna was not answering her Chatter, and a quick check of her frequent haunts turned up nothing. The green-haired woman had simply vanished, and Dinah felt more and more anxious by the hour.

Her anxiety was terrible enough for her to walk to Ally’s school and check her out early. Ally was safer at her side than at a public education facility. Dinah kept glancing over her shoulder as they waited for the bus to arrive.

“Why are we going home early?” She asked, squeezing Dinah’s hand.

“It’s safer there,” Dinah whispered.

“Why are we whispering?”

“Because we’re about to share secrets.”

It was difficult to keep from snapping. Minor sounds and movements agitated her. Anxiety rendered her even more vulnerable to over-stimulation than usual. Dinah feared a rapidly approaching sensory overload. The bus could not turn the corner sooner.

Ally swung her legs back and forth, humming as Dinah closed her eyes and willed herself to calm. Every so often, Ally would tug at her sleeve, a question in her eyes. Dinah’s answer was to shake her head and tap the Chatter on her wrist. Eventually, Ally settled for simply holding her hand again.

The back of Dinah’s neck tingled when they exited the bus at their usual stop. As discreetly as possible, Dinah scanned their surroundings. Her eyesight could feasibly be described as tetrachromatic; she could zoom in and out with a thought. Switching between vision filters was simple as counting to three. Infrared vision filters, night vision, and the electromagnetic spectrum were all available to her at a moment’s notice.

From where they stood down the street from their apartment, she saw the door slightly ajar and felt her proverbial hackles raise.

“Ally, the amygdala is tingling.” She warned. It was one of their numerous code phrases to communicate danger.

She felt Ally’s muscles tense, and reluctantly released her sister’s hand. In the event of an emergency, or a similarly dangerous situation, they had agreed upon a meeting point beforehand. Ally tugged at her sleeve, and upon her insistence, bent down to receive a quick goodbye kiss before Ally darted across the street. She soon disappeared beyond an overgrown fence.

Now, it was up to her. Dinah flexed her hands and started forward. Each step closer to the apartment made the leftmost coolant pump in her chest flutter. Whether in anticipation or anxiety, she did not know.

She rose up on the balls of her feet to ascend the stairs, and stepped lightly, carefully. Pausing every few steps to listen, Dinah could not deduce whether or not someone was still present within the apartment. She pressed herself against the wall and switched her vision filters. RF-capture, or wi-vi, allowed her to peer through walls. A handy feature, and one Mum had received praise for including.

There was definitely a person inside her apartment.

Hands clenched into fists, Dinah deduced this would be a perfect field test for the dazzler technology integrated into her arms. Old, but reliable technology for non-lethally disabling human aggressors. Emitters in her knuckles allowed for the manipulation of objects or weapons while offering illumination for simple eyesight or the disabling of aggressors.

Wi-vi was able to clue her in to the fact that whomever this intruder was, they were currently waiting by the couch with a clear view of the door.

She inched closer and closer, until finally she was able to kick the door open and aim her knuckle emitters at the intruder. She closed her eyes for a moment, but could clearly see the light flashing behind her lids.

She was stunned to hear Shoshanna’s voice shriek. “What the _FUCK_ , _DINAH_?”

Quickly, she switched off the emitters and took a step back. “You say that like you didn’t just break into my apartment…”

The green haired woman was sprawled out on the ground, one hand over her eyes and one grasping her stomach in what seemed to be discomfort. Dinah knelt and rolled her onto her side. When Shoshanna hissed and slapped at her hands, she warned her, “Nausea is a right common reaction to dazzlers. If you do vomit, best you be on your side than your back, aye?”

Shoshanna bared her teeth in an ugly grimace and said nothing. Dinah sat back on her heels. There was nothing to do but wait until Shoshanna’s symptoms either subsided or went into full effect. She doubted the room would stop spinning for the other woman before the clock counted ten or so minutes.

Ultimately, a full fifteen minutes passed before Shoshanna was able to sit up. She held out her hands and asked for water. Dinah also retrieved a wet washcloth to lay across Shoshanna’s forehead. She left again and returned with pillows, and a blanket. Pillows would help Shoshanna become more comfortable, and a blanket would serve the dual function of both warmth and soothing sensory stimulation. Cotton tended to be magical, and it was once again proven true in Dinah’s eyes.

Seated cross-legged on the floor, Dinah struggled to maintain a sense of calm. This was not the first time Shoshanna had done alarming, even vaguely threatening things to her, but somehow this cut too close to the core of her anxiety. The thought of losing Ally after she had lost Mum left her feeling cold, numb and frightened. Conflicting emotions of panic, anger, anxiety, and compassion made it difficult to think for a moment, so most of her actions had been thoughtless gestures of empathy.

Dinah opened her eyes and resolved to remain level headed. Bluntness would serve well for now.

“Aye, so what do you want?” Shoshanna always wanted something, and was always angling to get it. No point in dodging the question for much longer.

The green haired woman put a hand to her chest as if in silly drama. “ _Dinah_! I, for one, am gravely offended you think so lowly of me!” She took a sip of water. Dinah let her head roll back to stare up at the ceiling with an exasperated expression. Finally, Shoshanna continued. “You’ve heard about the nuke theft?”

“Aye. What of it?”

“Well, I still dunno who it was. Definitely someone in our outfit, but I’ve had eyes on our transits to and from Secundus. No one’s taken them there.”

Dinah scowled. “They mean to keep them groundside.”

“Exactly.” Shoshanna took another gulp of water, then two. “Look, I’m not one to talk to about hoarding nukes. For space battles? Aye, sure, whatever. But on colonies?” She glared at Dinah. “Did you see anything suspicious?”

“No, sorry.” Dinah shook her head. “It happened before I was on shift, and I ran straight home after I learned what was stolen.”

Shoshanna sighed heavily. “Well, keep your eyes peeled. Consider this a security concern.”

“I need to know my sister is safe.” Dinah set her jaw and held Shoshanna’s gaze resolutely. “I need to you notify me immediately if anything happens that may threaten her safety, or her life. And I need to you step in to help me if something happens to her.”

They stared at each other for a long, uncomfortable moment. Then, at last, Shoshanna nodded. “A promise is a promise. I told you I’d take care of you, didn’t I?” She folded her arms comfortably, and reclined against the pillows. “I’ve got keys to each stockpile in the area. Don’t think it’ll come to that, or at least I hope it won’t… But consider this an invitation. You need any munitions, you come to me.”

“Hope you realize I _will_ hold you to that.”

Shoshanna closed her eyes and smiled. Dinah thought it look strange on her face; more an expression of pure felicity than sinister joy at seeing a plan unfold just the way she wanted. “Good. Hold my feet over the fire while you’re at it, then.”

“Pfft.”

 

* * *

 

Several yards past the docks due west was a dilapidated house left to rot on its foundation. Overgrown trees provided ample shade during the day and ominous darkness at night. One of the largest and oldest trees in the area was home to an old treehouse, built by the former inhabitants of the house and subsequently abandoned. Dinah heard tell of it as the old Pevensie place, where a young family had lived with their two young children until the eldest died suddenly. Then the Pevensies left Elysium City and abandoned their lakefront property. There were whispers they had left Eridanus entirely.

 

Dinah stepped through the tall grass as quietly as she could, and paused just outside of the treehouse tower’s line of sight. She whistled an old tune, a familiar tune.

Ally’s voice rang out from within the confines of the treehouse. “Caer Paravel opens its doors to you, stranger.”

“Do you have a Geiger counter?” Dinah asked.

“Mine is in the shop.”

She smiled. “Come on down, Ally.”

The wood creaked noisily if one was hasty or unwary. Ally, however, had explored every inch of the once-loved play-place and had made it her own. Every other weekend, Dinah brought her to the lake so they could restore it together. With a cot, some rugs and other minor amenities, the treehouse withstood the elements just fine. She imagined Ally could hide there for two weeks maximum before she would be forced to leave to seek new sources of food.

A soft thump told her Ally had leapt from the window. Dinah shook her head. “I understand it’s good practice, but let’s not sprain our ankles tonight.”

Ally stretched and sighed. “How did it go? Was it Shoshanna?”

Dinah only groaned and ran a hand down her face. Ally, of course, laughed.

 

* * *

 

 **S:** see anything?

Dinah scowled at the floor, thumbing through multiple filters before coming up empty. It was surprisingly easy to respond to Chatter messages while searching for more clues. But aside from the security breach scare and the systems still glitching, they had very little to go off of. After a week, evidence tended to be scarce.

 **D:** Nope. Hairs all belong to my engineering crew.

Another sweep confirmed her fears.

 **D:** Deck’s been wiped down so many times, you can’t hardly differentiate fingerprints and trails.

 **S:** gdi… thanks for checking. I’ll send out more feelers meanwhile

 **D:** If all else fails, I’m sure walking around with a Geiger counter may help.

 **S:** lmao thanks

 

* * *

 

Another week went by. Dinah remained tuned in to the news in an effort to remain up to date on any recent developments. It was phenomenally boring. And, perhaps for the first time, she appreciated the gift of Chatter Shoshanna had given her. She was growing closer to Shireen and Nelaros from work, as well as Eudoxia. Idle messages throughout the day tended to lift her spirits and draw a smile to her face.

Dinah marveled at how she was becoming more adept at conversation and especially humor. She still sometimes dreamed of the adventures that could be found in friendship. It certainly sounded magical to hear others describe it.

New Year’s was a stressful time. Dinah felt more anxious than usual, tense and unsure. She took up her habit of listening to the news once more. The trawler program she planted nearly two months ago dutifully reported back changes to files and deletion. Eventually, sometime this year, she would have to remove the program before it was discovered and tracked back to her. It would be replaced with new, updated programs and processors, of course.

When the fireworks began, Dinah noted how her coolant pumps reacted to her rising anxiety. Any one of those firecrackers could be a nuke in disguise, and at this range, she would be vaporized and unable to do anything to protect Ally. Her thoughts nearly spiraled out of control. The leftmost pump fell out of sync with its siblings, and she froze when it slowed and threatened to stop entirely.

A terrible thought occurred to her.

_What if there was no glitch?_

 

* * *

 

Winter on Eridanus was mild compared to Reach. There, the cold seeped into even the deepest bunkers below ground. It hadn’t even snowed this year. Dinah grumbled to herself as she grabbed her usual cup of tea on her way to the space elevator. She rather liked snow, and spring was nigh. All too soon, she would face the quandary of summer fashion and invitations to the lake. She had no solution for swimming, and it was unlikely to ever occur. Quite simply put, a woman made entirely of metal would not float, but instead sink straight to the bottom.

Fortunately, this giant metal woman did not respire.

Dinah enjoyed the scent of hibiscus tea as she walked briskly to the space elevator, and took one last chance to relish the heat it emanated. When spring came, she mused, temperatures wouldn’t necessarily be high but they would be uncomfortable.

Pantomiming one last sip, she tossed the cup in the trash after the doors opened for her to enter the space docks.

It had been two years. She still felt an sweet sense of nostalgia when she reminisced. She felt she was closer to being human than she had before. Despite the anxiety, the nightmares, and terror, she felt accomplished and proud. Only way to go from here was forward, and she felt ready.

The day went by slowly. April was not a particularly busy month. May would see their workload increase as UNSC warships pulled in to dock alongside humble merchant vessels and cruise ships. Eridanus II had a charming small town vibe, and its climate and dazzling lakes saw a good bit of tourism.

Engineering team Epsilon was currently overseeing routine maintenance tasks for a UNSC vessel’s Shaw-Fujikawa Translight Engine. Risky work, but rewarding. Aerospace engineers with a specialty in Translight engines were rare, but Eridanus II boasted a fully-equipped team of seven engineers with such a specialty. That alone was enough to tempt spaceships in to port at Eridanus despite threat of rebels and pirates in the system. Additionally, the UNSC frequently made use of the Eridanus’ local engineers’ services. Dinah had received many a recruitment offer, much to her surprise ( she did not consider herself to be prime military material ) and had turned them down, citing her need to care for her “younger” sister as a primary motive.

Maintenance was dangerous work. Before Dinah had joined, Team Epsilon had seen two of their own simply vanish in the last five years. The laws of physics simply worked differently around active Translight Engines. A major part of Dinah’s education had centered around these devices. Her intended mission would have seen her the sole active person aboard the ship during slipspace jumps and long-distance travel. That left her and only her to oversee maintenance and repair on the _Northumbria’s_ engine.

No matter how defiant she had been, she acknowledged at the time how these lessons were immensely useful.

Dinah rocked on her heels as she cleaned tools and smiled at Nelaros’ joke. They could never stop their jests even in risky situations, it seemed. She was fairly content with her work, and lost track of time.

Luckily, Shireen recommended they all take a break sooner rather than later. Dinah quickly agreed; the space-time warping common to Translight Engines might have altered their perceptions insofar as she knew.

Their shift was drawing to a close by that time, much to her surprise. It had not seemed very long since they entered the ship’s engineering deck and began their repairs…

She followed close on Shireen’s heels to the break area, and flicked the lights on. When alone, Dinah did not mind the darkness or keeping the lights dim. But with others, it was best to avoid questions about the odd blue-colored luminescence around her eyes. Shireen squinted, but did not complain. Nelaros stumbled in behind, already shrugging on a jacket over their coveralls.

Dinah checked the inside of the kettle before filling it with water. Shireen was doing the same with the coffee pot. Nelaros liked to cook and bake, so they usually brought enough food for the entire team during break. Dinah set the kettle down, collected her usual ingredients for hibiscus and chamomile tea, and programmed the kettle to brew. She smiled when Nelaros handed her a small baggy filled with cinnamon sticks. If they suspected she did not eat or drink as well enough as she faked, then they did not show it.

The break room included a television set and cable. Dinah could not see the remote.

“Oi, what’s the deal?” Shireen asked when she noticed Dinah fumbling around for the controls.

“I want to check the news,” she replied.

Nelaros laughed. “Oh, I’m sitting on it!”

“Arse,” Dinah huffed good-naturedly. Nelaros lifted themselves enough to allow Dinah to grab it quickly and hit the power button.

The usual mid-afternoon news reporter’s animated voice filled the room, and the trio sat back to watch the scrolling text as coffee and tea brewed respectively. Nelaros kept their hands busy; tossing salad for the vegetarian Shireen, throwing granola bars at Dinah and folding sandwiches for their self.

“I’m jealous of her fucking _energy_. How does one stay so… _Hyper_?” Nelaros finally sighed, looking mildly aggravated.

Shireen poked them with her toes. “Well, she gets to sit down a lot more and has commercial breaks to do her hair.”

“She’s got nothing on _these_ curls, okay?” Nelaros preened, brushing their auburn hair away from their eyes.

“You simply cannot be matched in your full glory.” Dinah agreed dramatically.

They all collapsed in laughter. Dinah stretched and rose to check on the kettle. She nudged Shireen. “Looks like your coffee’s halfway full.”

“Fuck yes!” Shireen leapt from her chair. “Give me _all_ of the creamer.”

Dinah pulled down the hazelnut bottle and handed it to Shireen. “Nearly empty. Whosoever empties it…”

“—Buys the next, aye. Shove off, Dia. I won’t forget to replace it.” Despite her harsh words, she winked over her shoulder.

The kettle whistled loudly. Nelaros had to raise their voice over it.

“Dia? You might want to come see this…”

Hands full of cups and sugar and cinnamon and kettle, Dinah half turned to glance at the television screen. The reporter was no longer smiling, and instead sounded more like she was dramatically reading a horror movie script.

“— _Taken primary education facility one-nineteen hostage with a HAVOK tactical nuclear weapon, their motives being unknown as of yet_ …”

Distantly, Dinah registered the sound of glass shattering and the icy pinpricks in her fingertips. Her coolant pumps beat against her chest as if trying to burst.

Shireen gasped softly beside her. “Isn’t that Ally’s school?”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> There is a ton of references and hints in this chapter. Brownie points will be awarded to the one who can spot them all! :) I'll try to upload a new chapter next week.


	6. Chapter 6

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> In which Dinah experiences a trial by fire.

_Go faster_ , she thought desperately. The space elevator remained at its now-tremendously slow speed. Dinah tapped her Chatter. Four frantic messages from Eudoxia. One message from Shoshanna. She opened it.

_Hey, meet me by the docks. Looks like our thief finally came out to play._

_More than that, you idiot._ Dinah thought heatedly. _More than that…_

Ally being in danger had been a major factor in her accepting Shoshanna’s offer to join. She knew better than to trust them, Dinah realized bitterly. As easily as they had given her the means to provide for Ally and build a new life together, they threatened to tear it all down once more.

_Mum is dead and never coming back. But they won’t have Ally,_ she swore. _I have to stop them… I have to…_

She ran once the doors opened. A quick glance around showed no sign of Shoshanna, so she broke out into a sprint and threw all caution to the wind. No muscles meant no cooldown period required. No lungs meant she did not tire or fatigue. Dinah ran and ran until she entered the docks. Then she slammed her heels down and paused, debating inwardly.

Dinah surrendered and hollered: “Shoshanna! Where the devil are you?”

“…Not so loud. Bloody hell, Dinah.” Green hair peeked around a corner, and that was all Dinah needed to see.

She grabbed Shoshanna by the shoulders and hauled her up against the nearest wall. She let her anger and hurt and terror show on her face, and lifted the green-haired woman off her feet. “ _I trusted you_ ,” Dinah began slowly, softly. “Ally is all I have left and now because of you, she could die. _She could already be dead_!”

The green-haired woman simply stared at her, shocked and speechless. It occurred to Dinah then that they had never touched each other before, and now she was no longer concealing the strength she possessed. Few humans could so easily lift another, even at her height of nearly seven feet. Dinah looked down and away, and placed Shoshanna back on her own two feet. She walked a few paces away, crossed her arms and took a moment to compose herself.

“I need to get in there,” she said finally. “I’ll need a few things first.”

“Are you mental?” Shoshanna snapped. “You’d need an entire squad to breach that building by now!”

“I am the squad.” Dinah replied. “I used to be UNSC. I can get in, and disarm the bomb.”

“Used to be, eh? I knew you couldn’t be a simple civvie.” Out of the corner of her eye, she saw Shoshanna’s expression pinch and twist ever so subtly. She did not appear pleased.

“I was a kid,” Dinah clarified. _Still am, technically. Legally speaking, if I wasn’t property._ “It wasn’t what I wanted, so I ran away.”

A derisive snort. “You’re AWOL?”

“Let me be frank: I was a minor at the time. Literal child soldier.”

That changed Shoshanna’s opinion. “Are you sure you want to do this though? If you were a kid, then—”

“I need to disarm that bomb,” Dinah interjected. “And I can take out the gunmen before they hurt anyone they haven’t already.”

“Look, I can’t just let you waltz in and kill—”

“I’m not going to kill anyone.” Dinah stated firmly, calmly. But her patience was tested. “Listen, I can neutralize them non-lethally. It’s-it’s my specialty, and my preference. Just tell me you have the munitions and supplies I need, and I promise I won’t kill any of your comrades.”

“ _My_ comrades,” Shoshanna echoed.

“After this, do you really blame me for losing trust in you and the others?”

Shoshanna closed her eyes, and rubbed the lids wearily. “No, no I really don’t. Can’t, actually. I promised I’d take care of you and your sister, and look at how I mucked it up… What do you need?”

“An ODST BDU if you’ve got it. I can make it fit with a few adjustments…” Dinah held up fingers for the items needed. “Medical stuff; I can pack it on once I find it. Some disarming tools, and I need some smoke grenades. No guns. I won’t need those.”

Shoshanna nodded, but Dinah could see the doubt in her eyes amid growing fear. Dinah did not complain when Shoshanna drove like a maniac to their supply cache, but she did protest Shoshanna’s almost overbearing insistence on certain items. By the time she had herself fully kitted out and ready to move on to the education facility, Shoshanna’s fear had become outright terror.

“You’re going to die because I fucked up,” she murmured. Dinah hummed and leaned against the door. That last left turn was too tight for her preferences, but she did not admonish Shoshanna’s rather poor driving today.

She was focused and had her eyes solely set upon a solid goal. Dinah was determined not to fail this time. She couldn’t lose Ally… Not after she had lost Mum, too.

Brakes screeched in protest when Shoshanna finally stopped the car at the junction they agreed upon. Dinah exited the car and scanned the rooftops.

“Looks like law enforcement hasn’t brought out any snipers,” she noted.

Shoshanna grasped her wrist. “Hey.”

Dinah raised her eyebrows and yanked her arm away. Then, she pulled open Shoshanna’s fist and squeezed her fingers. “I’ll be fine. This isn’t my first time.” _Officially,_ she thought inwardly. _Training with live rounds definitely counts._

Shoshanna’s face fell. “What did they do to you?”

“It’s behind me now,” she replied. For the first time, she found the tiniest part of herself believing it. She still grieved for the loss of Mum, yes, but she felt she could see an end to the pain. “I’ll be back.”

_I can do this._ She told herself.

She slipped the helmet on and ran the BIOS firmware as she took a running leap toward a sheer office building wall. She had to be careful with the amount of force used to grasp the wall; it was all too easy to puncture holes in it to gain a proper footing. Booting up the BIOS firmware and the VISR software wasn’t necessary, but she thought it a nice backup just in case. Her own programming, firmware, software and scanners were far superior, of course. Dinah still believed backup to be prudent.

Ill-fitting as the BDU was, she was able to move around fairly well in it. Even so, Dinah could not help but balk at the restrictions to her movement as she scaled the wall.

Once up top, she was afforded a better view of the scene just a few blocks north-northeast. The entire section was cordoned off, employees of nearby businesses sent home while frantic and weeping parents and guardians awaited news at the police station where it was safer. Dinah did not hear anything of substance on local law enforcement channels, so she checked the UNSC wide band.

Needless to say, it was on fire.

UNSC starships and other vessels boasting personnel of note were all communicating on channels of varying encryption. Dinah spent a moment sorting through the most substantial conversations before she came across a nugget of valuable information. A few civilian spouses of UNSC officers lived groundside, and some of their number had children. Their children attended local schools, one of them being facility one-nineteen. She was able to discover a one Navy captain had an ex-wife on Eridanus. Their name was Yang, and they also had children with their former spouse. On the channel, the captain named Yang sounded concerned and distressed about the turn of events, and Dinah found very little news of an organized response as of yet.

Dinah felt a brief bout of dizziness. That was what they were after, then. Innocent children blamed for the crimes of their parents.

_No._ She thought, and reminded herself to focus. She unclenched her fists and rose, waiting for the signal. The one concession she had made was to allow Shoshanna to cause a localized blackout. Not an EMP blast by any means, but the cloak of darkness—even for a few minutes before power breakers kicked in and reactivated—would allow her to effectively bypass the security blockade set up by law enforcement. Dusk had come and gone, and if she moved quickly, she could avoid detection before anyone grabbed a torch and hit the power button. Battery powered devices would be her enemy.

Just as promised, a few minutes later, Elysium City saw a small section of the northeast lose power.

Dinah did not hesitate. She could not afford to anymore. She took a running leap and tucked into a roll on the neighboring building’s roof. Rising to her feet, she eyed the distance to the next building and deduced she could make this one as well. When she landed in a roll, she had to remain lying prone to avoid the narrow beam of a curious torch from a window across the street. After the light switched off, she waited for three minutes before she moved again.

Voices from the streets were loud, even from above. Dinah was glad for the helmet fitting, at least. She was able to alter the auditory input to her liking. Four more buildings cleared, and finally her goal loomed before her. Primary education facility one-nineteen was rather large to accommodate students from many nearby small towns, and Dinah knew she would not be able to reach the roof from this building.

_That’s fine,_ she decided after a few moments of study. She could hit a window from this distance with enough force to shatter it and land inside. From there, she would have to be on her feet especially fast, shed whatever glass trail she created, and begin locating each rebel. The bomb was likely in the cafeteria, or the gym, on the ground floor. Roof access was likely guarded, if these rebels were smart. But even they could not defend every last window and door. Patrols would have been assigned by now.

Moving a few paces back toward the opposite edge, Dinah uttered a quick prayer and underwent her final leap, this time into the abyss. She tucked herself into a tight ball and grimaced when she hit the glass. It shattered upon impact, sending showers of deadly sharp shards every which way. Dinah imagined she might have suffered more than a nano-second of disorientation if not for the ODST helmet that currently protected her face and delicate hair.

Hesitation could get someone killed. She rolled to her feet, brushed her arms with two quick swipes and then her torso, and then ran to the left as fast as she could. Careful not to tap into the VISR programs, Dinah pulled up a map of the facility and examined it. This was the fourth floor, and there were six not counting the roof. She needed to go up and then work her way down, ideally.

The sound of breaking glass was not exactly quiet, however, and her brief hesitation meant that this floor was already swarming with rebels sweeping the area with flashlights and loaded guns. Where she crouched in a locker room just beside the stairs was hardly safe, and the vents above her head were tempting…

She switched to infrared vision and peeked out the door. Only a few people were close enough for her to spot, with one nearby, moving their arms side to side with what might be a flashlight. _What morons_ , she thought sadly. They should not have split up so readily.

The rebel was already headed in her direction. It was only a matter of waiting. Eventually, they made their way to the ever-so-slightly ajar locker room door and freed up a hand to palm it open. Dinah was waiting on the other side, knuckles pointed their way. She quickly activated the dazzler effect. They yelped and covered their eyes, dropping their weapons in the process. Dinah advanced as they stumbled back, grasped their arms and pulled them into the room. She unbuckled their helmet, pushed it back away from the base of their skull and applied a tiny amount of force there. Unconscious, they fell limp in her arms and she arranged them on the floor quickly, picked up their fallen pistol and removed the clip.

She pocketed it and reached up to brace her hands on the tops of the lockers. Using it as leverage, she raised herself up, removed the vent hood she had previously unscrewed and slipped inside, remembering to replace the hood as a precaution.

Not a moment later, two more rebels burst in and swept the room. Dinah slithered through the vents on her belly, and unscrewed a vent hood just around the corner. She waited, watching for more rebels, before she dropped down and slipped back inside the locker room. The door clicked shut audibly. The two rebels turned and one opened fire. Dinah thanked her lucky stars they only had a pistol; the other had a shotgun and still did not fire even when she rose to her full height.

Bullets struck her along the chest and a little further down, around her stomach. Dinah gritted her teeth and bore it silently, intent on moving forward. She grasped the wrists of the shotgun wielding rebel and twisted. They gasped and dropped the shotgun; she yanked them forward into a head-butt. She endured three more shots from the pistol as she lowered the now-unconscious rebel to the floor. Then, she heard it click hollowly. The clip was empty. She smiled grimly, and quickly sent them spinning with a swift, hard jab. One careful blow to the back of the head—for some reason, these two weren’t wearing helmets—robbed them of awareness. She then lowered them to the floor and left the room. The door slid shut behind her with an audible click.

Walking on the balls of her feet, Dinah stuck close to the wall and paced the corridors. When she failed to spot another hostile entity after five minutes of pacing and checking rooms, she turned around and took the stairs to the third floor.

Infrared told her there were about three rebels in the vicinity. Odd. Dinah guessed they might be gradually falling back, closer to the ground floor. They were still spread too far apart as well. She took one out easily enough, but realized belatedly she was getting a little too desperate to reach the second floor when, just after she finished a tussle with the second rebel, the third exited a classroom and shot her square in the chest with a burst of bullets from an assault rifle. A second burst sent her sprawling to the floor, trying her best to not groan in pain.

The world was spinning before her eyes. Distantly, Dinah registered a sharp jab in her side. A hiss of pain stole her attention. She found it quite difficult to focus all of a sudden, but a voice soon drew her back from a canvas of blurry shapes to the real world.

“Damn, you’re built like a rock… What _are_ you?”

Pressure accumulated square on her chest. Dinah quickly grasped it and found it was the rebel’s ankle. They struggled.

“Shit! You’re alive?”

Beneath her helmet, Dinah smiled. “I’m bulletproof.” _Literally_. She threw them off and rolled to her knees.

Throw was perhaps too heavy a description for the amount of force used. Dinah always had to be mindful of her full strength and moderate herself in regards to how she interacted with the world. Thus, she only used enough force to push the rebel back and upset their balance. They lost their footing and fell, landing on their buttocks. Dinah raised her hands and switched on the dazzlers in her knuckles. The rebel swore, eyes squeezed shut, and tried to scoot back. An arm slipped and they fell to their back on the floor. Dinah rose and left them whimpering on the floor.

It was time to make adjustments to the plan. Crouched in a dark classroom, she paused to check local channels and look herself over for any major issues. The cuirass was pockmarked from gunfire, but otherwise fine and she did not see any punctures. The vest beneath was still in good condition, and she still had most of her supplies tucked away in pockets. She grumbled internally when she realized she would have to dump the stolen clips she had accumulated somewhere, preferably in a place where one who might be irresponsible with such items would not find them.

Local channels proved to have interesting new information. The UNSC had apparently taken over the situation from orbit, and she recognized the protocols as being ONI, specifically DCS, although she suspected Section One might be involved by now. Local law enforcement were simply maintaining the perimeter for moment, and caring for the parents and guardians of the hostages. Dinah was able to find that there was a claim that a UNSC team had been dispatched from the space docks in a pelican to deal with the situation. As of now, she was unable to tell if it was genuine or a false alarm.

That meant she had to move _now_ lest she be caught by UNSC forces. She felt doubly terrified now, for Ally’s safety and now for her own. No doubt, if the UNSC forces came in guns blazing, then the rebels may very well set off the nuclear warhead, and kill millions. Dinah knew all too well that the UNSC, and especially ONI, simply did not understand how moderation of force and judicial use of non-lethal action could defuse situations much better than killing.

_I’m not going to let that happen_.

Dinah left the classroom and took the stairs to the second floor.

Education facility one-nineteen was large and boasted an impressive staff for their professors, teachers, principals and other certified professionals. It was one of the few education facilities that had elevators. Dinah, however, could not often enjoy elevator rides. She was quite simply too heavy, and even when she was not, it was still safer to utilize staircases instead. Descending staircases also offered some advantages over ascending, such as a better visual vantage point.

After her second circuit of a corridor, Dinah began to feel very concerned she had not found any more rebels. She moved to another part of the building and paced around, searching impatiently.

Then, the intercom crackled to life.

“To the UNSC team currently in the building: You have five minutes to meet me in the cafeteria before I set off this bomb.”

_Oh shit_ , she thought. She recognized that voice. Then, registering what they said, she wondered, and planned. _They’ll never believe just one person did all this. I can’t just turn myself in…_

That left the flashbang grenade, and to use that, she had to warn the hostages somehow. Ally knew sign language. Mum had taught them both and used it as a form of secret communication. Multilingualism was the rule now, with only a few languages slipping through the cracks to allow people to communicate without too much surveillance. The issue with the plan was getting close enough for Ally to notice and read her hands…

Time for distraction, then.

Dinah raced down the steps and palmed the door sensor, then turned and darted away. The door would agitate the rebels and perhaps encourage them to investigate. 

The cafeteria had many entrances and exits to accommodate massive amounts of students and staff. The kitchen was practically cavernous with its many corners and rows of supplies. She had to worm her way through vents and employee-only entrances to gain access without alerting the patrolling rebels. One rebel was in the kitchen, and thoroughly undisciplined from what she could see. They had opened a snack item, removed their gloves and were happy chewing away at the salty treats.

Dinah seized the opportunity. She confronted them quickly with the dazzler technology integrated into her arms, and quickly locked them in a walk-in refrigerator after divesting them of their helmet and weapons. Peeking through the serving counter’s window, she spotted the hostages forcibly gathered around the warhead. Dinah found a leftover spoon and crept over to the door that separated the kitchens from the cafeteria itself. No one stood outside it, likely trusting the fool currently trapped in the walk-in to keep it locked down.

She pushed the door open a tiny amount. No reaction from the rebels. She might’ve sighed in relief if she could have. She threw the spoon far across the cafeteria and closed the door, careful not to let it move lest it give away her position. The spoon hit the opposite wall with a quiet, but noticeable noise.

Once their leader motioned for two of the eight rebels she counted to investigate the disturbance, she removed her helmet, peeked through the counter window and looked for Ally. Her coolant pumps lurched uncomfortably when their eyes met briefly. Ally’s then wandered a bit before focusing on the window where Dinah imagined she could make out a pair of luminescent blue eyes. Dinah wiggled her fingers. Ally’s expression shifted between confused and relieved.

Dinah signed at her, asking how she was doing. Ally looked around warily before answering. She wanted to wilt; Ally’s answer was that she was terrified, suffering from anxiety and generally not doing well. Dinah relayed the plan to her, and upon receiving a confused look, repeated it two more times before Ally responded positively. Now, she had to wait while her sister played the telephone game, quietly whispering directions to the children and adults around her. The word was passed around, over and over, with greater clarity each time as words lost in translation were found again.

Slowly, each of the hostages began to cover their eyes and ears. The youngest of them curled up and were pulled closer to the staff to be better shielded. Dinah threw another plastic spoon out the door as distraction. It pinged off the far wall. A few of the children jumped, startled, but did not open their eyes.

Within a few more minutes, the message had been passed around enough times that everyone appeared to understand that they were to keep their eyes closed and ears covered for an incoming blast. Dinah slipped her helmet back on and gave Ally a thumbs up. It was their final signal. Ally nodded and curled in on herself, eyes closed and hands over her ears.

Dinah primed the flashbang, and tossed it from the open window. Then, she ducked and curled in on herself to prepare for the sensory bombardment. No amount of armor she had access to currently could sufficiently block or lessen the sensory stimulation she received from the world around her. Even if there was, she assumed it would be a poor decision to exploit it. Her hypersensitivity was the norm now, and anything less would be disorienting at best, and debilitating at worst.

Flashbang grenades were an excellent choice to bring, in hindsight. The presence of hostages almost demanded the total exclusion of lethal force. Dinah shielded the helmet with her arms as the grenade went off. The best part about them, she believed, was that even at close range, they did very little physical damage to living targets.

She rose quickly despite the dizziness she felt, and kicked the kitchen door off its hinges. The loud clang it made when it struck the far wall only added to the confusion. Dinah could not waste much time. The rebels were still armed, albeit nearly disabled. She grabbed the nearest one and swung them around, delivering a precision strike to the head as they spun and lowered them to the ground with care.

Nine rebels, one down by her own hand. That would normally leave eight, except three others had been totally disabled by the flashbang. They were not a concern. Five, however, remained such. Including their leader. Dinah wished she knew their name. They stood, slightly hunched over, rubbing at their eyes furiously. She noticed that, somehow, they had managed to holster their sidearm rather than lose track of it. Not good.

She could not abide by allowing potential injuries to occur when she could simply lower unconscious rebels to the ground, however. And one or two of the others still had their weapons in hand, which made them more dangerous. She worked as quickly as she could, taking down two more rebels without incident before one blinked furiously, squinted at her when she approached, and pressed the end of their pistol against her abdomen and fired until the clip clicked empty.

Dinah shrieked and stumbled back. None of the shots had penetrated her actual body, but the bullets pinging off armor and the heavy vest beneath was still painful. A chorus of screams echoed her. Dinah felt a surge of panic and hastily disarmed the rebel. They hissed in pain. She twisted the arm, turned them around and knocked them upside the head.

Another gunshot struck her in the side. She whirled around. The eighth rebel, not the leader, had drawn their sidearm and held it shakily as they squinted in her direction. Her feet carried her forward despite the way the world spun, how the colors blurred and blended together. Her hands found purchase on the rebel’s shoulders and she shoved them down, then followed. They struggled, but she knew her grip was too strong for them to break free from. She found the back of their head after some shuffling and soon they were unconscious.

“What are you?”

Dinah turned. The leader was staring at her incredulously, squinting and obviously straining to see despite disorientation.

“You’ve been shot multiple times, but you’ve barely slowed down. What are you?”

Dinah rose slowly. They tracked her with a shaking hand, pistol loaded and ready.

“Someone whose lost everything, everyone… Except my sister.” Her voice was distorted through the helmet, but understandable. “I don’t want to kill you, but I won’t let you kill her or anyone tonight.”

“I lost everyone once, too.” They said, looking torn between unsympathetic and mournful.

“What happened?”

“Far Isle. My wife and our child lived there… They were in the capital when the bombs fell.” Dinah winced at the hollow way they spoke, as if they had repeated the story so many times, they had become numb to it.

“You think killing these children with a bomb is the right thing to do?”

“The UNSC surely did.” Their voice now held heat to it.

“So you want to be just as bad as they are? Killing everyone here, and across the colony? And what about the widows and orphans left behind in the aftermath, like you were?”

Their jaw clenched, and their mouth set into a firm, grim line. They glared at her, as if furious for her revealing the obvious hypocrisy in their motives.

“Put the gun down,” Dinah pleaded. “Let me disarm the nuke. Take your group and leave. This is your only chance. The UNSC has already deployed counter-terrorist fire teams groundside.” When they stiffened, she added: “You have maybe an hour to escape, maybe one and a half. But only if you step aside _now_.”

“Why are you letting me go? How can I trust you?”

Dinah smiled sadly beneath her helmet. “Look at me.” She pointed to her chest, her utility belt, and then turned slowly. “I’m unarmed. I used my only grenade and it was non-lethal.”

“You’re able to withstand point-blank bullet wounds,” they shook their head and sighed. “You could probably kill me bare-handed.”

“I don’t want to kill you.” Dinah repeated. “Please, just go. Let me disarm the nuke.”

They stared at each other silently for a few, tense moments. Then the rebel leader finally sighed and retrieved a tiny module from their pocket. “Remote detonator.”

Dinah slowly walked forward, gingerly took it from their outstretched hand, and immediately shuffled to the nuke. Her fingers pried open the detonator, already at work pinching wires and tapping into mirco-processors. She heard them sigh softly. A glance out of the corner of her eye showed the rebel leader was working on reviving an unconscious rebel and recalling what subordinates had not been attacked by her. Their gun was safely holstered.

“Are we gonna go home now?” An exhausted and hopeful-looking child asked.

Dinah did not pause in her work as she stepped closer to the bomb. “Yes. You’re all going home. Scoot over a bit, please?”

The hostages, as one, happily began to migrate away from the nuclear device. They spread out further as the rebels began to leave the cafeteria. Dinah watched the rebel depart, and noticed how they offered a single backward glance before they slipped out the double doors. She turned away to focus on disarming the warhead.

After prying open the panels, she reached inside and felt around for the correct wires, motherboards and began hacking soon after her fingertips brushed an interior panel. The combination of hands plus wireless access resulted in an overwhelming success. All connections to the detonator were disabled, long-distance detonation sequences disabled and removed, and she had dismantled enough of the guts that it would require a nuclear engineer to put it all back together again in order to have it in working order.

This was only one of two, however. Dinah could do nothing more. The UNSC fire teams were nearly on the facility by now, so she beckoned silently to Ally, and waited behind the kitchen doors before slipping away with her.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you to all who have left comments and kudos! You're my motivation to keep going with this personal project. c: Slow season has arrived at my workplace, and so I hope to update a little more often now. Feedback is always welcome! Stay tuned for more nerdy references too~

**Author's Note:**

> This was originally posted on tumblr! :) It's still un-beta'd, but that's the nature of a rough first draft. Like the tags say, this will be oc-centric but will eventually feature canon characters. Thanks for reading! <3


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